Prior two piece cable ties have utilized a strap locking head to secure the distal ends of a separate strap around a plurality of elongate objects to secure the objects in a bundle. Reference may be made to U.S. Pat. No. 4,422,417 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,498,507.
A number of prior cable ties have utilized metal barbs inserted within the frame of the locking head of a cable tie in a position to flex upwardly to allow a strap to be inserted past the metal barb while engaging the strap upon attempted withdrawal to lock the strap to the head. Reference may be made to U.S. Pat. No. 3,408,699. Other methods of mounting a metal pawl such as the floating pawl of U.S. Pat. No. 3,875,618 and the metal pawls of the above '417 and '507 patents have been proposed.
Other types of one piece cable ties have utilized hingedly mounted plastic pawls as strap locking mechanisms. Reference may be made to U.S. Pat. No. 3,906,593. A major goal of cable tie design is to achieve the greatest possible ratio of loop tensile strength to strap insertion force, thus, providing a relatively high strength cable tie that is concomitantly easily secured in place.
Prior metal barbed cable ties provide relatively high loop tensile strength but also require high strap insertion force while prior one piece cable ties require relatively lower strap insertion force but do not provide the greater loop tensile strength desired in certain sizes of cable ties. Thus there is a need for improvement in the art.